News & Events.
exida Presenting and Exhibiting at AIChE’s 2019 Spring Meeting & 15th GCPS
March 13, 2019
exida will be presenting and exhibiting at the AIChE’s 2019 Spring Meeting & 15th GCPS to be held March 31 - April 4, 2019 in New Orleans. Stop by Booth #809 during exhibit hours.
This year we will be showcasing some of our newest functional safety, alarm management, and cybersecurity products and services that reduce engineering time and minimizes risk.
Presentations
Also, Denise Chastain-Knight, Senior Safety Engineer, Iwan van Beurden, Chief Technology Officer, and Kate Hildenbrandt, Product Manager are among the presenters at this year’s event.
106b - Perfecting Proof Test Effectiveness; How More Extensive Testing Can Improve Safety and Reduce Cost!
We all know that a period functional test of the components in Safety Instrumented Functions is necessary to ensure the appropriate safety integrity is maintained. These tests on some of the most reliable equipment in a plant are occasionally disruptive and intrusive in the process. However, in general the necessity of the tests is acknowledged. The second edition of the IEC 61511 functional safety standard for the process industry sector identifies the need to take the proof test effectiveness into consideration. This proof test effectiveness indicates the percentage of undetected failures revealed during a proof test. This parameter can have quite an impact on the overall achieved safety integrity. At the same time the parameter shows that more comprehensive tests will positively influence the achieved safety integrity. This paper will discuss the concept of proof test effectiveness and through a practical example, using a floating ball valve, show how more extensive tests will improve safety and at the same time can reduce cost, e.g. maintenance cost due to lower proof test frequency requirements as well as equipment cost due to lower level of redundancy required.
exida Presenter: Iwan van Beurden and Kate Hildenbrandt
Date: Tuesday, April 2, 2019
Time: 2:00 PM - 2:30 PM
Location: Hilton New Orleans Riverside - Compass
51a - Don't Let Your Safe Operating Limits Leave You S-O-L (Out of Luck)
Collection and Utilization of process safety metrics is an important tool for driving improved safety. Tier 3 leading indicators (challenges to safety system) indicate failures of process safety management systems and highlight areas that should be improved to prevent a more serious event. Safe Operating Limit (SOL) exceedances are a commonly used Tier 3 indicator. Surprisingly, there are many different approaches used in industry to calculate safe operating limits and how to apply them. This inconsistency potentially diminishes the usefulness of SOL exceedances as an effective indicator.
This paper discusses current industry practices around the determination and application of safe operating limits as established by a recent benchmark survey of over 150 safety practitioners from around the world. Areas explored in the survey of SOLs include; methodology for calculating, how / where information is stored, how / when established values are reviewed and audited, usage as a Process Safety Management Leading indicator, integration with operations (training, documentation), identification and tracking of when exceedances have occurred, and actions taken on exceedance. Key results and conclusions will be presented as well as recommendations on where industry should focus on improvement.
exida Presenter: Denise Chastain-Knight
Date: Monday, April 01, 2019
Time: 3:30 PM - 4:00 PM
Location: Hilton New Orleans Riverside - Chart B/C
125a - Confirming the SIS Layer of Protection
The Safety Instrumented System (SIS) is a complex protection layer with high reliability requirements. Assuring the effectiveness of the SIS requires monitoring the effectiveness of the Safety Instrumented Function (SIF) as well as the Independent Protection Layer(s) (IPL) that reduce demand on the SIF. A SIF tripping more frequently than anticipated may be due to flaws in demand reducing IPLs. A slower than expected or failed SIF trip may be due to flaws in the SIF components, the proof testing program, the maintenance program, or inadequate SIF design. This paper will identify parameters that should be routinely monitored, illustrate how data can be captured and analyzed detect weaknesses in the SIS IPL, and provide recommendations for routine monitoring and audit activities.
exida Presenter: Denise Chastain-Knight
Date: Tuesday, April 02, 2019
Time: 3:45 PM - 4:15 PM
Location: Hilton New Orleans Riverside - Chart B/C